


the most dangerous thing is to love

by bi_magic



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Angst, Canon Era, Dark Merlin (Merlin), M/M, i accidentally saw the merthur week prompts and was like.....Yes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-17
Updated: 2021-03-17
Packaged: 2021-03-26 14:13:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30107208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bi_magic/pseuds/bi_magic
Summary: the air around them is thick and heavy, swirling with magic, and arthur has never felt so betrayed in his life.(written for merthur week 2021, day 3: "we're meant to be on the same side." "we've never been on the same side." the general theme is angst so, whoops. this isn't happy.)
Relationships: Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Comments: 3
Kudos: 40
Collections: Merthur Week 2021





	the most dangerous thing is to love

**Author's Note:**

> so i dont actually have an active tumblr right now (like i sort of do but theyre all rp blogs and im just generally not v activ anywhere lmao) but i stumbled across the merthur week post and figured i'd contribute my share. this prompt spoke to me, so i wrote this thing in like a day and decided to just post it and hope u all enjoy !!  
> title is from "achilles come down" by gang of youths.

arthur is standing in the courtyard and he's never been more scared in his life. he is the king of camelot, the most powerful man in the kingdom - except now he thinks he's not and never has been. he stares, sword drawn, at a man whom he had considered a friend until just a few moments ago.

merlin is both exactly the same and completly unrecognizable. he looks... hollow, made entirely of voids and empty spaces. his cheek bones are knife-sharp, his skin taut, thin over muscle and bone, his eyes golden rings in his face. he looks otherworldly, terrifying. arthur decidedly does _not_ shake. he isn't afraid of anyone, let alone merlin. 

the air around them is thick and heavy, swirling with magic, and arthur has never felt so betrayed in his life. the setting sun lights merlin aflame, and he glimmers, gold and terrible, taller than he's ever seemed before.

with a barely noticeable flick of his wrist, something arthur wouldn't have noticed if he wasn't so used to being in tune with merlin, the knights standing behind him fall to the ground with quiet groans. slowly, in time with the twitches of merlin's fingers, everyone in the courtyard gets knocked off their feet, thrown onto their backs, tossed around until they're all rendered unconscious, one way or another. everyone but arthur. (he continues to look around for the next few minutes, but no one else comes. he figures merlin's spell - how weird to say those words, how heart-clenching - must have taken down the entire castle. and so they are alone.)

they stand before each other: arthur stoic and proud, merlin indifferent and fearsome. arthur has never seen him this way before; no smile, no snark, just a mystical, quiet presence. he can't think, can't process any of this, tries to focus on swallowing down the sense of betrayal burning in his throat, the pain of having trusted merlin with everything he has only to be disappointed. everyone else in his life has already betrayed him one way or another, so he shouldn't be too surprised, but he is anyway. he is, because he never expected merlin to be one of them.

merlin had been - something, to arthur. had meant something.

yes, perhaps this thing that has lived between them all these years is made entirely of stolen glances, gentle smiles, emotion laced into casual words; but it's still somthing, arthur knows that. they're a part of each other, inexplicably connected. it would be stupid of him to deny it. _maybe_ , he thinks, _that's why it hurts so much_.

"why are you doing this?" the words come out a plea, hardly fitting for a king, but arthur doesn't care: he has been through too much to just let this end here, at the hands of his - well, whatever merlin is. was. they have been through too much together for this to be the end of it. "I thought we were friends." his chest is tight as he speaks, but he continues anyway. his words spill from his lips relentlessly, like petals, like bullets.

but then he thinks about it, and he and merin were never really just friends, were they? he doesn't know what he intends to say, to call them, when he starts again: "I thought we were -"

"so did I," he's cut off (and maybe that's a good thing because he still isn't sure what to say/0, merlin's eyes narrowing just slightly as he speaks, always an irritating inch taller than arthur. this is the first time it feels like he's also bigger, fuller, greater than him. it's a new sensation, being small, and arthur doesn't like it. "but I guess we're not."

arthur thinks he can guess what promoted this, though he hadn't thought, at the time, that the death of yet another accused of sorcery would have such an impact. the law against magic has been in place since he can remember, and while he's questioned it several times, even defied it once or twice, he has never had the thought to change it. how could he possibly, when he's still trying to follow his father's legacy?

"you never told me," arthur breathes out, the only thing he can possibly think to say. the broken trust still cuts deeper than the fear, sits heavier than the anger, settling in his bloodstream: a reminder for later of how much it hurts.

merlin's face twists into a smile. it's different from any expression arthur has ever seen him wear; feral, almost animal. "maybe I just didn't want to die," he replies, voice sharp like shards of glass. arthur opens his mouth, means to ressure, to tell him that no, he wouldn't have killed him - would he?

merlin cackles at arthur's lack of response. he almost seems smug, like he's been proven right.

"we're meant to be on the same side," arthur says after a long silence, in a final attempt to bring merlin to his senses, his voice breaking with desperation. a shadow of a smile crosses merlin's face, only barely there, but there's no mirth in it, and that makes it somewhat frightening. merlin is cold all over in a way arthur has never seen him, in a way he can't describe with words other than _cold_ , like he's dressed in winter, biting and merciless. the humorless laugh that rolls from his lips is like thunder, and it rattles arthur's bones.

merlin tells him unceremoniously, "we've never been on the same side."

arthur is certain he can feel something shatter in his chest, so much so that it sounds audible to his ears. he wondrs if merlin can hear it. probably not. (it wouldn't have made a difference either way.)

"if we were on the same side, you wouldn't have stood by and watched my people die for years," merlin's voice thickens little when he says the words _my people_ , the only emotion arthur has caught from him since he showed up at the palace gates: when he had been so happy to see him unharmed, until merlin's eyes had started glowing gold and he knocked over the first guard without so much as touching him. his presence is dark now in a way it has never been before. he steps closer to arthur. "I forgave you for it when you were prince, I understood your loyalty to your father but once he was gone - once you were king, didn't you think to stop the bloodshed?"

arthur doesn't answer, can't answer. there are too many things on his mind, his head a crowded, breathless space. he feels... betrayed, and angry, and sad, and hurt, and hateful, and afraid, and now guilty because _is it really his fault merlin turned into this?_

after another stretched out silence, merlin sighs. "no. you didn't."

with a tilt of his head and a flicker of gold in his gaze, merlin disarms arthur (who has truthfully forgotten about the sword in his hand) and brings him to his knees. the king of camelot, kneeling before a warlock. if his father could see this... arthur shakes his head. thankfully, his father can never see anything he does ever again.

merlin walks over to him, steps unnaturally soundless on the stone tiles. a hand comes up to touch athur's cheek bone, jaw, chin. arthur doesn't move, isn't sure he could have if he tried. he pushes shuddering breaths in and out, tears in his eyes. _he won't cry_.

"I don't want to hurt you," merlin tells him, gaze tender and voice soft, suddenly so similar to the merlin arthur knows, or thought he knew. but the words out of his mouth aren't something his merlin would have said - his merlin wasn't powerful and he accepted it, knew how to get by with just his wits and his stubbornness. this merlin is a creature of the cosmos, a force of nature. dangerous. destructive. beautiful, in a way. a single tear slips out.

merlin's hand, still ghosting over his skin, wipes the tear away. he makes arthur look him in the eyes, and not by physical force. "don't go against me, arthur. you can't win."

his eyes are a shade of blue that arthur has never seen, like a sea at storm. he thinks he might drown, and he isn't sure if he'd resist it. at this point, guilt and betrayal and terrible love coursing through him, he thinks maybe he's alright with that. with letting go. giving up.

except he's arthur pendragon, and he hasn't given up on anything in his life.

"I'll fight you, merlin." his words are harsh and stern, an attempt to drown out the tremor in his voice. when merlin just stares down at him, mouth curled slightly in a way that says _contempt_ , arthur changes his strategy, covers merlins hand with his own where it rests on his cheek. "I'll fight _for_ you."

it doesn't look like anything is changing, or like merlin is having second thoughts. it seems he's made up his mind already - but then why, why hadn't he just tossed arthur out the window, or poisoned his food, or for the gods' sake, just killed him in his sleep? why did he have to give arthur a fighting chance, and with it, a broken heart?

(deep down, he knows neither of them would have had it any other way.)

merlin's long fingers move below his jaw and tap once, and arthur gasps as the air drains out of him. he desperately tries to breathe but he can't, he can't, and even if his chest had felt tight with betrayal before, he recognizes that this is clearly magic, pulling all the air from his lungs, screwing his throat shut in a way that feels unnatural and unwelcome. merlin stands above him, and stares as he suffocates.

until, after what feels like forever, he draws his hand back. the pressure disappears.

he looks up, eyes watering, a string of coughs escaping his mouth. even now, merlin doesn't look angry, not a hint of cruelty on that pure, pure face of his. he still doesn't look wicked to arthur - just alien. severely lacking in all the things that had made him merlin.

"I don't want to hurt you," he repeats, less gentle than before, still gentle enough for it to sting with memories of tenderness between them. his eyes are hard and gleaming, like gems. "but I will if I have to."

he leans down then, presses his lips to arthur's temple. they're soft, freezing, completely unnerving. arthur shivers under the touch, and merlin steps back. the love that shines in his eyes, now more blue than ever, is overwhelming. but then the moment passes, and it's gone. arthur tries to remember how to breathe.

"take this as a warning." merlin says, and then turns and walks away. arthur wants so badly to follow him, but he finds that he can't move. he doen't know if it's the magic holding him in place or the heartbreak, and deep down he wonders how merlin is so unaffected. perhaps magic users really aren't human.

but - he still sees him there, his merlin, his servant, his right hand, the person he trusts most in the world. and despite all his efforts to accept the truth, the two versions of merlin still live seperately in his mind. he doesn't understand how they could be the same man.

he watches merlin's back until he's out of sight, and listens to the sounds of his people, beginning to shift awake.

once agin, he faces that same, terrible choice. leading a witch hunt against a loved one, or letting them destroy him and his kingdom. and even as he ponders it, arthur knows: camelot will always come first, even in the times he wishes it didn't.

he rises to his feet.

**Author's Note:**

> sooooo that's it, idk how pleased i am but i really wanted to participate and write this prompt and i had to complete it in a pretyy short time so idk. i hope you enjoyed reading, i encourage you to leave kudos / comment if you did (or if you didn't! i don't mind critism) <3


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